Down the Rabbit Hole

Should I Nano?

This morning I'm am considering on whether or not to skip this session of the Nano challenge. On the one hand, it may give me the focus I need to actually finish a novel. On the other hand, my "focus" is already in short supply. Between the concerns about my job security, concerns for my father and his pending divorce, my growing and increasing more mobile daughter and the strain on my marriage, I am feeling doubtful that I could put any real effort it. It would simply become one more thing I half-ass and don't complete. Frankly, I don't think my self esteem could take me failing at one more thing. The best I can manage is to keep blogging, if not every day, at least every few days to keep my internal wheels of my writer's brain spinning. Afterall, it has been hard enough, In what seems to be a daily onslaught of negativity, to keep finding the positive. If it weren't for my daughter's wide smile and cheeky giggles, I'm not sure I could.

The brightest spots in every day are when she wakes up in the morning, brimming with unexplicable happiness and when I walk through the door to pick her up from daycare and she lights up for me, as if she's been waiting all day in that very spot for me to return. Recently, after my father thanked me for giving him such a beautiful grandchild, I told him that there was something very healing and wonderful about holding Jaden. No matter what might be going on in the world around me, when I pick her up and press her small, solid body against mine and breath in the sweet, fresh smell of her...I can know no greater joy. I am amazed at how very blessed her father and I are to have her. I've thought a great deal about Melanie lately. Last month marked a year since she has passed. When we made the decision to name Jaden after her, I had hoped my daughter would be inherit my cousin's strength, her grace, her never-ending optomism and her unconditional love. Even though Jaden is barely 10 months old, she has displayed all of those qualities and so much more. I know Melanie has touched her soul and it gives me still grieving heart special comfort.

It is funny, it took me about six months to really feel like a mother. Now, I can't imagine being anything else. How did I ever question the decision to have children? What other job could be as important, as challenging, as scary and as rewarding. My husband has grown into a wonderful father, though I am hardly surprised. He comes through the door at the end of the day, thinking only of his daughter, his adoration and pride showing in every smile and in his soft brown eyes as she reaches for him. At night, when she's curled between us and his hand finds mine across her tiny frame, I realize that regardless of what we have sacrificed as a couple, it has been revisited upon us threefold in our little family unit. Lying there in the dark I pray for my family, for the man and child I would give my life for. The fears, the negativity, the stress can not stand up against the hope that burns bright in my family, my baby girl at its very center.